The present invention relates to an absorption cooling apparatus that is used as an outdoor machine for an absorption air conditioning system and which cools the heat transfer medium used to activate the cooling operation of an indoor air conditioner. The invention particularly relates to an improvement of the mechanism for dispensing the liquid refrigerant.
Among the known absorption cooling apparatuses is the one that is described in the Unexamined Japanese Patent Application Publication No. Hei 1-134177 and which is applied to an absorption air conditioning system. The general layout of the cooling apparatus is shown in FIG. 3. A liquid refrigerant from a condenser 1 is forced by a pump 2 below the condenser 1 so that it is collected in a refrigerant reservoir 4 above an evaporator 3; the liquid refrigerant is dispensed on through a multiple of holes in the bottom plate of the reservoir 4 to enter evaporation compartments 6; the liquid refrigerant is evaporated on the peripheral surfaces of circulation pipes 7 penetrating the evaporation compartments 6, whereupon the heat transfer medium passing through the circulation pipes 7 is cooled by the resulting heat of vaporization.
In the absorption cooling apparatus described above, the liquid refrigerant is collected in the refrigerant reservoir 4 above the evaporator 3 and the dispense holes 5 are distributed in the bottom plate of the reservoir 4. If the evaporator 3 tilts in certain situations such as during the assembling and installation of the cooling apparatus, variations are prone to occur in the dispense of the liquid refrigerant through the holes 5 and the resulting variations in the cooling performance of the evaporating refrigerant in the evaporation compartments 6 can potentially reduce the cooling performance of the cooling apparatus. As a further problem, although the atmosphere in the evaporation compartments 6 is at low temperature and pressure, the passageway of the liquid refrigerant has high temperature due to contact with outdoor air and, hence, the circulating liquid refrigerant tends to evaporate before entering the evaporation compartments 6, potentially leading to a lower efficiency in the supply of the liquid refrigerant.
The present invention has been accomplished under these circumstances and has as an object providing an absorption cooling apparatus which not only assures uniform dispensing of a liquid refrigerant within evaporation compartments but also prevents its evaporation before it enters the evaporation compartments, whereby the cooling performance of the cooling apparatus is enhanced.